


Six Flights of Stairs

by deathtodickens



Series: Unscenes: A Canon-ish Fix [1]
Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: F/F, Fluff, cat lady - Freeform, unseen scenes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-08
Updated: 2014-05-08
Packaged: 2018-01-24 01:31:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1586702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathtodickens/pseuds/deathtodickens
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place during 3x11 "Emily Lake" and it is my idealistic take on the unseen that occurs just before, during, and after Pete's scuffle with the undying assailant that is charged with retrieving Emily Lake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Six Flights of Stairs

**Author's Note:**

> Clearly these characters are not mine. I'm just doing with them whatever I please. If there are inaccuracies, I am afraid I cannot apologize for that, but hopefully they don't ruin the entire experience. Any and all feedback is welcome, I am just beginning my excursion into fan fiction and these faux deleted scenes are kind of my favorite.
> 
> Also, if anyone wants to drop some fanfic community truth bombs on me, please do. Because I am so not up-to-date on the etiquette of posting fan fiction.

"B-but... Dickens!"

"No."

I force Emily Lake into the hallway as the apartment door slams closed on her protestations, and a loud mew sounds off in agreeable protest from the other side of the barrier. As the lock clicks into place, Pete’s voice responds in muffled annoyance, “Trust me, Dick, we’re doing you a favor. You’d probably be skinned before nightfall with _that_ woman’s track record.”

Helena, Emily rather, gasps at the barely audible accusation, giving birth to a hilarious new facial expression that lingers somewhere between horror and disgust.  She glares back at the door as if attempting to pull it from its hinges with only her eyes, adorably oblivious to the fact that the only thing actually coming unhinged around her is standing just to her right.

"I’d never!"  It comes out as a yelp and I have to hide my smile.

The version of this woman that I know would have casually recalled a time, during one of her many overseas adventures, when she had actually tried and enjoyed a fully prepared meal, wherein the main dish was some sort of feline-based delicacy.

This version of the woman looks on the verge of losing what’s left of her resolve at the thought of any harm befalling her precious Dickens.

"We leave. The cat."

Her glare turns to me now but softens into the most pitiful, pleading look I have ever seen on HG’s face.  So, I repeat the words, voice softening to a whisper, but I say it clearly and I say it sternly because I will be damned if I get stuck looking after a subpar version of HG Wells and her goddamned cat to boot.

"But..." She starts.

"The cat stays!"

She clamps her mouth shut with indignation.  A pout quickly takes up residence on her borrowed HG lips.  Lips that, had they been occupied by their true owner, might not have stayed pouting for much longer.

_She’s not HG, so shake it the fuck off, Myka.  Also, time constraints, remember?_

The woman startles and I’m assuming it’s more from my staring at her than it is the ever tightening grasp I have on her wrist, but she stops walking, all the same.  She returns my stare with a look that I can only surmise is a combination of fear and uncertainty.  Another of those expressions that I can’t say I have ever seen cross HG’s face before.  

_With exception to that moment an hour ago, when Pete ran into her classroom all hot, bothered, and overcompensating with his Tesla-as-a-cock out._

" _Emily_."  I drag out the vowels in her name like I do with Pete’s name always.  It’s a warning as I tug her arm forward, and she takes only a single step before she tenses her entire body against my pull.

HG is literally out of her mind, but the evidence of her kenpō training still shows in the strength of her resistance.  It’s that same strength she used whilst hoisting me into the clouds that day with the grappler, narrowly escaping our own demise on the hood of a Suburban. The same strength she restrained herself from using that day atop an unstable mountain in Yellowstone, where she threatened to end us all without even enough resolve to end my life alone.

She could have kicked my ass then, if she had truly wanted to.  She _could_ have ended it all in that moment, had she truly wanted to.  She also could have saved me the trouble of trying to coax a less adequate version of her down six flights of stairs, in this sorry attempt at a rescue mission.

 _Damsel in distress?_   I laugh at the thought _.  More like pain in my ass._

"What an absolute _waste_ of muscle mass."  I don’t mean to say it out loud, or even as crudely as I have, but it’s of no consequence.  Emily, or HG without her memories, seems to lack any sort of witty responses, and favors passivity and theatrical melancholy.

 

_Listening to her self-assuring mantra of “I am Emily Lake, Emily Hannah Lake” while on the verge of an asthmatic attack, on the short ride to her apartment from the high school, had been almost as intolerable as Pete’s relentless insistence that she has always been a mastermind of deception.  
_

_"_ Especially _with you.”  Was the part that earned him a swift fist to the arm from where I sat in the back seat with the broken record that was Emily Hannah Lake, trying to convince her inner self of her own identity.  
_

_“Driving!”  He motioned to the road in protest._

_“Not even HG is_ this _good.”  I said, ignoring him as he rubbed the sore spot on his arm._

_“She’s not exactly winning any Oscars, Mykes.”  But he was not listening. In typical Pete fashion, he either did not fully understand what I was saying, or he chose not to hear it, and I had no inclination to spell it out for him._

What I mean to say is, _I did clarify for myself,_ even as a hologram, Helena can barely keep her composure around me. If this is my Helena, pretending not to know who I am, well, let’s just say she had better not be my Helena.

_Then, to test my theory, I placed a comforting hand on her shoulder._

_“Helena.”  She instantly recoiled._

_“My name is Emily Lake. Emily..."_  
  
"Hannah Lake.  Yeah yeah, we know.”  Pete shakes his head.  "Decepticon."  

_She reached into her purse then and pulled out an inhaler, placing it to her mouth and pumping twice, each dose followed its own deep inhale._

_My eyes met with Pete’s in the rear view mirror just then.  “Convinced?”  I asked._

_“Anyone can get an inhaler.”  He shrugged and averted his eyes back to the road._

 

“You don’t scare me.”

Her voice is uncertain when it revives me from my reverie and to the hallway just outside of her apartment door. Her eyes narrow and, stealing a note from my own playbook, her lips purse a little too far outward.

“I’m sorry?”

“I take self-defense classes, you know!” I’m guessing it’s meant to be a threat, but her voice is wavering and she nearly chokes before she can reinforce this information by telling me “I know."

"Well, Babe, you might want to get your money back, because they don’t seem to be doing you any good."  She whimpers at that but straightens her stance with renewed courage.

“You don’t seem like much of a threat all on your own.” I imagine it comes out softer than she had intended because it sounds more like relief than insult. Still, she pulls her limb from my grasp and crosses her arms over her chest. I smirk when glancing at her new defensive position because, yes, if she should be protecting anything from me right now, those would be it. But then she turns her cheek to me and her nose to the air as if she’s really trying to snub me right now, and this, I decide, is when I’m fed up.

"We don’t have _time_ for this, Emily." I say it through gritted teeth and hazard a glance toward the elevator. The "three" displayed above its doors turns into a "two" all too quickly, as it’s called down to retrieve what I am more than positive is her would-be assailant.

 

_“How do you know he’ll take the elevator?” Pete had interrogated, just before we left the apartment._

_“He’s not going to wind himself before kidnapping someone by walking up six flights of stairs, Pete.”_

_“Good point.”_

 

I regain my hold on her arm, still crossed over her chest (where there may or may not have been some boob-brushing but who is really paying attention? Not me), and pull her forward again, but she remains resistant.

"You need to _make_ time." She says quietly, with her shiny new faux courage. "How do I know going with you i-is any _safer_ than awaiting this… this so-called kidnapper?"

“Do you _really_ want to find out?” I ask.

She stands her ground.

"You. Are infuriating." There’s no malice in my voice then. If anything, I’m enamored by her false bravado. It’s endearing. Even attractive.

This woman, the softened and hollowed shell of a woman I once knew so well, probably doesn’t deserve the callousness of my attitude toward this hastened reunion. She doesn’t know what she did to me, or what she did to my stability. To us, or what could have become of us.

She doesn’t even know what she’s doing to me right now, in this very moment. Now that she’s within arms reach, now that I can touch her and feel the warmth of her against my palm. Actually hear her breathing, see her neck pulsing, smell her aroma, which is surprisingly still the same.

It’s not her fault that she has no idea what I am to her. Or could have been.

"Look, Emily." I soften both my voice and my grip, stepping too far into her personal space, and slide my hands into hers, rubbing my thumbs against the soft skin of her wrists. Her hands have always been so small in mine. She looks down at them momentarily with furrowed brows, then back up where our eyes lock. "In another life, that I just don’t have time to get into right now, you are _very_ important to me."

I say it slowly. Her hands are trembling. I close my eyes, because no matter how much she isn’t HG, she still looks like her. With her mouth shut, and sans the offensively bright outfit (or any outfit, period), she could very well still _be_ her.

"I _cannot_ let anything happen to you. It would break me. I know you don’t remember me, but you just have to trust me."

Cue my turn to start choking on words. My eyes begin to water.

_Goddamn this emotional bullshit._

It must be allergies.

_Goddamn you, Dickens._

I further soften my voice to hide the fact that it’s barely stable, but the urgency of our situation is testing my patience. “So.” I clear me throat and blink away the moisture in my eyes. “Could you please, _please_ , stop being so fucking stubborn and let me help you for once?”

I open my eyes to her, catching her gaze only for a second before averting my eyes to the elevator. It has begun its ascent.

She studies me for too long before speaking. “Are you... some sort of stalker... or...”

All the things I want to yell at her in response to her accusation only escape my mouth in the form of one very large groan. I drop her hands and throw mine into the air, then down again, as if to reach for her neck but I don’t and she smiles all too innocently.

“Infuriating!” Another loud groan escapes me.

"Some of my female students have admitted to having a sort of attraction to me and, like I tell them, I’m truly flattered but…”

"Stop." I raise my hand between us, palm to her face. The best shield I can provide for myself at this point. "Just. Stop talking."

"It’s nothing to be ashamed about." I feel myself becoming nauseous and for a split second I’m thinking about being rejected by the body snatcher that is currently taking up space inside of Helena, and I am trying not to laugh. “I’m just not…”

"Ashamed?” I cut her off. “Why would I be ashamed? I am an adult woman, _Emily_. I am _very_ comfortable with who I am. I don’t…" I laugh, maybe too loudly for this pathetic attempt of an escape plan. "No. Nope. I am not having this conversation with you." I try shaking the annoyance from my mind but it lingers. I have to walk away, so I turn toward the entrance to the stairwell, leaving her to converse with my backside.

"You’re a beautiful woman, I just don’t think kidnapping me is the best, or even a necessary, approach to professing your attraction for me." I can almost hear the delight in her voice.

"I am _so_ happy to see that your ego has not been hampered despite your current," I wave my hand at her flippantly, "condition, Helena."

"It’s Emily." She corrects. I wave my hand at her again, to brush off her reminder. Like I need to be reminded that she isn’t who I would really love for her to be right now. "You just seem to have fairly strong feelings for me. It’s a little overwhelming when I don’t even know you."

I’m already walking away.

“I’m done. I am walking away and I’m done and he’s just going to take you.  I’m just going to let him take you. And yes, it’s okay Myka, because she’s not your Helena anyway. Just walk away.” My hands are at my temples now and I’m through the door. “Keep walking, keep walking, keep walking.”

And this is the thing that finally gets her to follow me into the damned stairwell.

 

"Wait! Myka, right? Wait, I’m sorry."

I’m halfway down the first flight when she asks, “You knew me, then? Before my accident?”

"Your accident?"

Is that the story they’re spinning? Some sort of amnesia-inducing head trauma she obtained during an accident? Apparently, the Regents are taking their notes directly from daytime television.

Make no mistake, it’s not that HG being in a car accident would be the most unbelievable thing. I’ve told her, on more than one occasion, that she could never argue against woman-driver stereotypes in her own defense. Then she’d pull the Bronze Card, of course, as if being 100 years old has made her physically incapable of learning how to properly drive an automobile. Obtaining a driver’s license even.

 _Teenagers do it everyday_ , I’d tell her. _Even Claud learned how to drive a car eventually._ _Add to that, you’re a genius. You would think you’d be capable of... of at_ least _keeping the damn thing between the designated lines._

"I don’t know anything about my life before that. Other than what I’ve been told by law enforcement." I visibly cringe at the sound of her voice breaking through my thoughts of Real HG.

She notices my flinching and a pout returns to her lips. For some reason, I cannot shake her sad eyes, even knowing she’s not Helena. And at that, I stop and I can’t help the sigh that falls from my lips. I take a few more steps to the landing, in an attempt to put more space between her fifth-floor apartment and where we stand, on the steps, like fools. No doubt, her would-be assailant is a mere few steps away at her apartment door, about to be greeted by a cookie-crumb-laden agent of the law.

Emily had unwittingly offered _a_ cookie to Pete before she partially succumbed to her current fate of walking down six flights of stairs with yours truly. He had already stuffed at least five into his pockets before we were even out of the door.

"I knew you." I say softly. "Know you."

She takes in a long, steady breath, a very thoughtful HG look returning to her face. “Were we...?”

I narrow my eyes at her in anticipation of her question.

"Together?" All at once the next level of this epiphany hits her. She gasps. "Am I gay?"

I roll my eyes.

"No, _Emily_." I have to force the name out of my mouth. "We weren’t together. Per sé." I continue my descent and she, thankfully, blindly follows. "And you’re not _gay_."

If keeping conversation will keep her walking, then I guess it’s story time.

"I mean, it would explain the string of horrible dates I’ve been on."

I lose my footing on the steps, but thankfully, catch myself on the railing. Nevertheless, she’s suddenly beside me, with a hand on my arm, and asking if I’m all right.

"You’re dating?" I glance at her with an arched brow, trying not to sound as ruined by this knowledge as I’m sure I do, and she’s smirking. More lively and Helena-like than I’ve seen her yet, except her cheeks flush with embarrassment and that’s something altogether new.

"If you could call it that." She smiles. "I don’t seem to be very good at it, though. Maybe I’ve just been going after the wrong thing."

The thought of her on dates, in Helena’s body, with modern-day men who have modern-day expectations, unnerves me, but I resist the urge to carry on that conversation, in favor of continuing our descent. I pick up my pace, to put distance between us, and she continues to follow.

“Please, don’t let it upset you.”

“Upset? What upset? Why would I be upset?” I’m taking two steps at a time now.

“I never even thought about women as a possibility.”

"You’re not _gay_ , He... Emily." Not _Helena, Myka. Not even close._ "Hemily." I settle on, amusing only myself. I dare to look behind me and HG’s slight head-tilt and brow-arch appear as she inspects my facial expression. I try to hide my smile at the familiar look on her face.

Helena probably could be gay, I suppose. Emily on the other hand…

"Then why…"

"You’re bisexual. Or Helena was… is. At least, that’s what you… she has always alluded to. And I can’t imagine you ever having a problem dating. Although, I’m guessing it might have something to do with that atrocious American accent of yours."

She gasps again.

"I don’t have an accent. What’s wrong with the way I talk?"

We are halfway to the second floor when I stop to face her.

"I probably shouldn’t be telling you this." I smile at her, to ease the previous blow to her still HG-like ego.  "But you’re English."

"English?"

"Yes. You’re super hot and you’re super English with a super sexy accent and, I’ve got to be honest, I’m starting to realize that the accent is about twenty percent of what makes you attractive."

She trails as I begin walking again.

"English?" She’s contemplating. "I _have_ always wanted to go to England."

I roll my eyes but the smile remains. Annoying as she may be, this version of HG is growing on me.

"You’re hovering at an eight out of ten right now. Keep talking and you might quickly find yourself a six."

"A six!" She’s appalled. I snort out a quiet laugh to myself.

She tries out an English accent.

"This is twenty percent, then? What about the other eighty?"

Somehow she’s really bad at an English accent.

"Well." We pass the second floor. "Twenty to looks, twenty to books and intelligence, ten to your _previous_ self-defense skills..." She pouts when I raise a brow in her direction. "And thirty to the grappler."

"The grappler?"

_If Helena could hear this conversation…_

"Never mind." I wave my hand absently to push that topic away.

"You’ve really thought this through, then, haven’t you?"

By now she’s abandoned the awful attempts at an English accent.

"Yes, well." I stop just outside of the door to the basement-level parking garage. "I’ve had plenty of time," I turn to find her almost literally on my heels, "to do so."

If Emily were HG, she’d know the power in that statement. But Emily is not HG. She quirks her brow like HG and she perks her lips like HG. She even has the audacity to allow her eyes to flit to _my_ lips like HG, and look about as flushed, in the process of doing so, as I have only ever been able to imagine her. And when she has finally shut up for more than five seconds, I still have to resist the urge to touch her, as though she is HG.

But she’s not HG and I’m resigning to the fact now. Before shit gets real.

"I’ll… have someone, uh, check in… on Dickens. Once we get you out of here safely."

"Okay." She smirks. "Myka." Only then does she get the English accent right.

"Don’t do that." I’m squinting at her now. I know it. Pete calls it my suspect face, but I don’t use it on suspects. I mostly use it on him when he’s being too nice, too quiet, or too mature at any given point in the day. And Emily is suddenly too nice, too close, and too fearless.

"Do what?" Another hint of HG flickers in her eyes. If I were Steve, I wouldn’t just be guessing that she knows what she’s doing. She _knows_ what she’s doing.

“Don’t play stupid.” These words are nearly breathless as they fall off my tongue, they don’t have the effect that I want them to have.

Another HG smile. “Then what can we play… Agent _Bering_ , is it?”

 _We are going to die._ And I think for a second that I would surely pay with my life for the opportunity to remove those God-awful clothes from Helena’s body.

"You’re not her." I say it mostly for myself. My self is not convinced. “Not really.”

She shrugs and, as if she actually can, steps just a little bit closer.

"But you’re rescuing me, all the same." She blinks slowly, flirtatiously. "Or stalking me, I honestly still haven’t figured it out."

Someone has grown confident in her six-flight excursion to the bottom of the stairwell. Had I known that revealing the nature of her past would have turned her into a slightly more tolerable version of HG, I would have done so long before we ever left that classroom of hers.

I already regret calling Pete.

"You know, on second thought, I’m sure Dickens can fend for himself for a couple of nights. I mean, cats are self-sufficient, right?"

"Don’t you dare neglect Dicky!" A more believable Emily Lake snaps back into this reality and I can’t stop the laugh that escapes me.

"Pete would never let that one slide." I decide aloud, shaking my head.

At that, her smile returns.

Somewhere, at the top of the stairwell, a door slams and the sound of hurried footsteps begins to echo down floors. I silently pray it’s Pete, but either way, we should not still be in this stairwell.

The fear returns to her face and her hands immediately reach out for me.

"And not forgetting that your life is in danger, we should probably go."

Her hands are on my arms before I can turn for the door, and she’s grasping tightly, glancing up the stairwell and then back to me.

"Wait. Myka."

"We don’t…"

"Have time. Yes, I know." She says it exasperated, as if _she_ has had to deal with _me_ this entire time, and not the factual other way around. "I just wanted to thank you for... you know, protecting me or... stalking me. Whatever the case may be."

"God, HG, can we just _go_?"

"Emily." I ignore how her face softens and how her eyes latch almost desperately onto mine.

"I’m sorry, I…"

And suddenly she’s kissing me.

It’s polite, too polite even. Not nearly as invasive as I would prefer but she’s also not the woman I prefer. Not mentally, anyway. She’s a very close second and if she’s trying to immobilize me, she’s succeeding. However slight this kiss may be, I can feel myself becoming undone and it’s too dangerous here. With hastened footsteps echoing down the stairwell. But her lips are so soft that I think I would pay with my life for this moment to last even a second longer than it should.

Her hands, still on my arms, give a gentle squeeze. My body trembles at the sentiment, because my mind is only thinking of Helena’s lips and of Helena’s touch. What Helena does to me, how infuriating Helena can be, how Helena’s always disappearing on me, leaving me alone everywhere, dissipating into thin air with her stupid conscious mind trapped in a Magic 8 Ball, and how fucking much I miss her.

My hands find their way to either side of the other woman’s waist and I pull her ever so slightly closer to me, our hips press gently together. She breaks the kiss off only for a moment before I can capture her lips again, and this time our kiss is not quite as polite, and a whimper resonates from between us. Its true owner is of no concern, it only serves as a conduit for the unrelenting feeling of gratification that is consuming me whole in this moment.

It’s then that my brain allows the encroaching sound of footsteps to invade my mind, pushing away thoughts of her, of Helena, and of this momentary comfort. My brain sounds off with an assault of logical reasons why I should not still be kissing this woman.

_You are going to die. You are both going to die. You are going to pay for this kiss with your life. You could be kissing Real Helena. Or you could be kissing fake Helena back at the Warehouse, where I’m sure all of the extra bedrooms are currently occupied, so she’d have no choice but to stay with you. Then again, she has a cat. She named her cat Dickens._

My body is relentless.

_She kissed Dickens with those lips._

That’s the truth that finally parts us and when I open my eyes to her, she has a look of accomplishment on her face. I try so very hard to hide my disappointment, but a soft groan of dissatisfaction gives me away when she removes her hands from my arms.

I curse Dickens under my breath, because I’m so very certain that everything is his fault.

"I fear you may be correct in your observations of my, well, Helena’s sexuality." Her voice is breathy and almost English, and heavy with arousal, which is weirdly suiting, even for Emily Hannah Lake.

"It’s almost like you’re _trying_ to get us caught." I say it with newly quickened breath. Had I even been breathing before now?

Her smile grows wide. I have a sudden urge to free her hair of that wretched pony tail.

"Looks like I’m not so bad at defending myself, after all." Her hand on my cheek brushes away a stray tear. "And Myka.” She blinks, smiles softly. “I’m sorry that I don’t remember. That I’m not _her_."

"Allergies." I say a little too defensively, forcing her to step back and only now removing my hands from her waist. I reach up for her hand, removing the too close contact on my cheek and pull her into the parking garage. "You can thank your stupid cat for that."

"Don’t blame Dickens for your lack of self-contro…" Her taunting goes unfinished as she crashes into me from behind. "Why are we stopping?" I instinctively reach back, a hand returning to her waist to guide her body behind mine.

"Steve?” It’s barely audible when I say it. He draws his weapon quickly and I’m suddenly face-to-face with the business end of a glock.

"Hey Myka." He nods just before tilting his head to see the figure behind me. "HG." Her hands find their way to my sides and clutch desperately onto fabric.

“What are you doing?” He’s been whammied. It’s almost always my first instinct.

“Your Telsa.” He demands. “Now.”


End file.
